Olivia Wilde has teased that her next directing project is “way bigger than anything I’ve ever taken on”.
The 42-year-old actress will be taking the helm on Naughty, a passion project which follows her most recent directorial outing - the critically-acclaimed The Invite.
Jennifer Aniston and Peter Dinklage are to star in the Christmas comedy and Olivia opened up to The Hollywood Reporter about the upcoming project.
She said: “I can’t believe it. This is a project we’ve been working on for years; it’s a passion project and I fought and fought and fought to get this made.
“I feel so grateful that we get to make it because it is a movie that aims to be in the spirit of Rob Reiner, a comedy that has a tremendous amount of heart at its core.”
As for Naughty, it will combine both comedy and tragedy - like The Invite.
But Olivia said she’s feeling somewhat nervous about taking on a project of this scale, having never done one before.
She said: “It’s also a much bigger endeavour and is something that is way bigger than anything I’ve ever taken on. I feel very honoured in this day and age to be able to direct an original theatrical comedy for a studio at this level.
“Universal is putting a tremendous amount of trust in me and the ability to be able to direct Jen and Peter, among a host of other incredible actors who are hopefully coming on board.
“I just couldn’t be more excited.”
Naughty will be the fourth time Olivia has directed - following The Invite, 2022’s Don’t Worry Darling and Booksmart - and os currently slated for a November 2027 release.
And she added to the Boston Hassle that directing herself has brought a new outlook to her acting style.
She mused “It was definitely thanks to my scene partners that acting in this film felt really fluid. It didn’t scare me in the way that I think I probably would have assumed, [That] it would be a very difficult thing to take on.
“I actually found it to be probably the most joyful acting experience of my life. I always liken it to playing on the NBA All Star team. It’s like somehow something went wrong, and I ended up on the team! [But] they make it pretty easy to play basketball.
